


The Rory Reginald Diaries

by watanukitty



Series: Family Business [5]
Category: Maleficent (2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-12
Updated: 2015-05-12
Packaged: 2018-03-30 05:00:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3923842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/watanukitty/pseuds/watanukitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aurora, being the girl that she is, is unstoppable once she sets her mind onto something. And this might just be her biggest, craziest idea yet.</p><p>(Or: Aurora comes up with a plan and tells everyone on the internet about it.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Rory Reginald Diaries

**Author's Note:**

> Written as part of Maleval Week, Day 3 over at tumblr, under the prompts "Aurora the Matchmaker" and "laughter".

It started out as an English project: record a video of yourself reciting one of the assigned poems, upload it on Youtube, and email the link to the teacher.

Simple. But then it gave her other ideas.

Aurora is sitting in the middle of her room. She fixes her hair, clears her throat, squares her shoulders. She gives a nod, and the camera in front of her begins rolling.

"My parents are in love," she says, shrugging as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "Truly, madly, _deeply_ in love."

"And everyone knows it too!" she adds. "I know it, their relatives know it, their colleagues know it, even Mr. Cogsworth on the third floor knows it."

"But you know who doesn't know it?" she asks, leaning in to the camera and narrowing her eyes. "Them."

"My name is Rory Reginald," she announces, "and the people who raised me are a pair of love struck _idiots_."

The video cuts. Somewhere in the background, Philip facepalms.

〜＊＊＊〜 

Aurora went on to share the essentials of her (god)parents' lives: how they met in college, rose through the ranks of their company together, sent her biological father behind bars, and unexpectedly got custody of her.

She was also very particularly lurid about their "unresolved sexual tension" too.

It doesn't sit well with Philip. While she hasn't specified who she's really ranting about, it'll just be a matter of time for people (assuming they get viewers--and god, he honestly hopes they don't) to figure out that the videos are in fact about Mallory Faye Moore, CEO of the Moore Group of Companies. Billionaire, philanthropist, fashion icon...a celebrity in her own right. The other party is, of course, Diaval Sable, her right hand man, second-in-command, and partner in all aspects but one. It's all very good tabloid material, now that he thinks about it.

But Aurora, being the girl that she is, is unstoppable once she sets her mind onto something. She's determined to show everyone how much of a travesty it is that two people who are perfect for each other aren't together. She hasn't fully considered what would happen if all of this blows over, because she doesn't think it would.

Perhaps that's what Philip is here for.

He has to hand it to her, though. She's consistently been outdoing herself ever since they met in grade school, and this might just be her biggest, craziest idea yet. And frankly, he's beginning to have a bad feeling about it.

"I'm beginning to have a bad feeling about this," he tells her, just as they're about to shoot episode two. Aurora merely giggles and brushes him off.

"Don't worry, Pip. It's going to be alright," she says casually, putting some last minute changes on the script.

"But--"

"Think of it as...doing them a really big favor," she tells him. He doesn't reply. She stands up from her desk and sits over to her usual spot, and gives him the signal to shoot. He sighs, and shuffles over to the camera.

Oh well, too late to back out now.

〜＊＊＊〜 

People actually watch the vlog, strangely enough.

Philip is horrified. Aurora, of course, is positively delighted.

"You know, I think it's the impersonations that did them in," she muses over her orange juice at lunch one sunny Wednesday. Philip just shrugs. He doesn't have the heart to tell her that his dignity is hitting critical levels because of wearing black feathers and a beak while acting as her godfather.

(She wears a pair of devil horns and highly contoured cheekbones as Mallory. He doesn't know what the reasoning behind the costumes is, nor how she manages to keep her outlook in life.)

"Where do you think this is going?" he asks her suddenly. Aurora pauses with her eating to turn and look at him.

"I don't really know," she admits, looking a tad crestfallen. "As long as there's a story to tell, I guess. It's just nice to have something to vent my frustrations out on. And it entertains people too, so there's that. We'll just see what direction it takes."

Philip nods in understanding. He gets that, a little bit, even if her measures of venting out may be a bit too extreme. He just hopes that the direction the vlog takes isn't that of trouble.

"Anyway," Aurora begins, back to her usual cheerful self now. "I've already got a plan for episode ten." Philip looks up from his red jello to see her place a bunch of papers on their table. He takes a piece and does a double take when he realizes what the drawing in it is depicting.

"Rapunzel drew me something and Belle wrote some fanfiction. We're doing a special fanwork feature!" She says excitedly.

Internally, Philip screams.

〜＊＊＊〜 

Nothing much happened after that. Except for some fanfic submissions, that is. He had the misfortune of being the one to sort through those.

(He really has to evaluate his life choices one of these days, he thinks. And find a way to clean out some nasty images off his head too.)

The vlog is running decently with a fair amount of subscribers on their channel. View numbers spike whenever Aurora does a dramatic fanfic reading, but he attributes that to people thinking that the fics might be about some fictional characters out there.

Whatever. He won't be bothered informing them otherwise.

Other than that, things pretty much remained as they were when they first started: Aurora rants about the happenings in their household, he shoots, they do some impersonations, he edits the videos and uploads them.

Same old, same old. Up until she accidentally records a video of her godparents, that is.

She must have left the camera running on the tripod when she tested it out on their living room. She went to look for something in the attic, and when she got back, ten minutes-worth of video has already been shot. She learned that Mallory and Diaval were home early too, judging by the sudden presence of activity from the home office and the kitchen.

Aurora called for Philip to come over, and only when he arrive did she tell him her discovery.

He silently applauded her self control for that.

They settle themselves in front of her tv and plug in the camera. There eyes tune in to the video, not really knowing what to expect.

〜＊〜 

They're greeted by a footage of an empty living room. From the camera's viewpoint, the couch can be seen up close, and the hallway from the front door only partially so. At the 1:05 mark, Diaval enters, followed closely by Mallory.

Even in the video they both look tired, drained. Mallory rounds the sofa and sits down, removing her black pumps as she went. Diaval follows suit and flops down on the arm chair next to the couch. Neither of them seemed to notice the camera.

"Where's the beastie?" they hear Mallory say. She moves to look around, but seems to have given up at not seeing Aurora nearby.

"She's probably poking around here somewhere," Diaval answers. He runs a hand through his hair and Philip notices how he seemed to have his gaze locked on Mallory.

Mallory sighs, and leans her head back on the backrest of the couch, her eyes closed. Diaval appears to have noticed this and walks over to sit on the couch beside her. "Are you alright?" he says, looking in on her, his eyebrows furrowed.

"It's just been a long day," she replies, sighing again. Diaval nods and his posture relaxes slightly at her answer. A few seconds pass and he drapes an arm over the backrest, his other arm reaching out for Mallory to lightly stroke her temple.

Aurora's breath hitches.

Mallory's eyes remain closed. Diaval stops his motions and tucks a strand of Mallory's hair behind her ear. He slowly removes his hand, but hers shoot up to take a hold of his. Aurora mutters something under her breath, and Philip unconsciously leans in closer to the screen to see what would happen next.

Mallory didn't push away Diaval's hand as they have expected. To their surprise, she brings their hands down onto her lap, and lets Diaval lace his fingers with hers.

Philip's jaw drops, and quick glance at Aurora tells him that she's also sporting the same expression.

"It's going to be fine, Mal," Diaval says. Mallory opens her eyes and turns her head to look at him. Seconds and then minutes trickle by as they stare at each other, with Diaval's head moving a fraction closer to Mallory's. 

The air seems to have left the room. Philip and Aurora gulp in unison.

Mallory and Diaval's faces are only inches apart now. Suddenly, Mallory jolts, as if woken from a dream, and whips her head away. Diaval looks down and takes his hand away from hers.

"I--uh, I better start dinner," he says awkwardly. Mallory nods.

"I'll just be upstairs," she responds, standing from the sofa and beginning to gather her things. Diaval remains seated as she disappears from the camera's view, and he too stands up after a few moments to walk to the direction of the kitchen.

The living room is empty again. After a few minutes, Aurora appears on screen, fiddling with her phone in one hand and holding a dusty pair of wings with the other. Her eyes widen as she notices the camera, and the video becomes shaky as she scrambles to take it off the tripod and stops the recording. The screen turns black, and the feed is cut.

〜＊〜 

"Holy shit," Philip says.

"I know right?" Aurora answers. He didn't need to look at her to see the shocked expression on her face.

"What the fuck was that 'Rora?!" he demands. Aurora, for her part, is still staring dumbly at the blank screen.

They sit together in stunned silence. Finally, Aurora recovers and asks him heatedly: "Did you see that?!?!"

"YES!" he shouts back. What the hell?

"Do you now see what I have to live with every single day?!" Aurora rants, her face now very red.

Philip exhales. "I gotta say: now I'm a believer."

Her mouth gapes in offense and she smacks him on the side of his head. "You _doubted_ me?!" she snarls.

"I had my reservations!" he defends, stopping himself from saying that he thinks she was exaggerating the whole time. He's sure to get something worse than a smack in the head for that. 

"We'll discuss that later," she promises, visibly calming down now. "But you do know what this means do you?" she asks with narrowed eyes.

"That by now you'd need a chainsaw to cut the sexual tension inside your house, and that your godparents have _insane_ amounts of resistance and mental strength to have managed to stop themselves from jumping each other for sixteen--SIXTEEN--years and that they could probably kill a man with the strength of willpower alone because of that?" he tries.

"Yes--No!" Aurora shouts. "Yeah okay. You're right about that. And," she says, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him vigorously. "this also means we have to do something!" she says.

"What?"

"We have to act!" Aurora declares, standing up and pacing around her bedroom. "No more passive aggressive ranting, no more dilly dallying around. We have to push them, shove them together if that doesn't work, hell, leave them stranded in an island if it comes down to it," she lists, her steps becoming more brisk. "We have to get them together. For real!" Aurora clenches her fist and waves it in front of her face to prove her point. "Now that I'm sure they're near the breaking point all we need now is to nudge them a little--okay, a _lot_. Godmother can be a bit stubborn...." she trails.

"Wait--'we'?" Philip squeaks.

"Yes Philip!" she snaps. Oh no, there's his full name. "You're going to help me whether you like it or not! Remember your pinky promise!" 

He remembers all too well. He groans.

"Didn't you hear that bit about killing people with their minds? They'd _obliterate_ us if they found out we've been meddling!"

"Just you, maybe. I'm safe," Aurora shrugs. "We _have_ to do this, Pip," she pleads.

He pushes his bangs out of his head. "But _why_?" he very dearly values his life, thank you very much.

"Because," she breathes, "the only ones standing in between them and their happiness are themselves," Aurora explains, her eyes glistening. "And what kind of daughter would I be if I didn't want my parents to be happy? I have to do something, Pip, because god knows they won't do it for themselves and I _need_ your help."

Philip doesn't answer. He tried not to let his best friend's puppy dog eyes get to him. He really did. Turns out that he just didn't have the strength that Diaval possessed when it comes to resisting.

He groans again.

"Fine," he relents, and Aurora's face lights up instantly. Jesus, this girl is gonna be the death of him. "But we stop when this gets too far, alright?"

"Sure," she agrees, and raises her right hand in promise. "I'll let you hold me back when I get in too deep," she says. "Scout's honor."

Philip nods. "Okay. So, where do we start?"

Aurora's face becomes serious again. "We need reinforcements," she tells him. "I'll make some calls."

He nods again, not really knowing where she's going at.

"Oh, and we'll include that footage in the vlog," Aurora adds, before stepping out of the room with her phone.

He nods yet again, and begins to take the memory card from the camera. A thought occurs to him, making him look at the tv, and then the door, and back to the tv again.

 _Shit_.

"'Rora!" he calls out, fumbling to his feet and out the door. "Aurora! _NO_!"

〜＊＊＊〜 

And so begins Aurora's Operation (God)Parent Trap, or, as Philip likes to call it, 'Put Those Two in Bed Together or so Help Me'.

He likes his version better.

It took them the better part of a week planning everything out, under the pretense of working on a group project. Aurora's 'reinforcements' turned out to be her friends, Mallory's uncle Robin, and much later, Balthazar, head of security in the Moore Group.

Her room was a mess. Papers, pictures, magazine clippings--anything they could need--were strewn and posted everywhere.

There was even a map with colored pins and strings.

("What's that?" Philip asks, pointing to the wall. Aurora glances to the direction he's referring to and shrugs.

"A map," she answers nonchalantly while continuing to write something on a piece of paper.

"What for?" he asks again, trying to make sense of the colored pins and the strings attached to them.

"Nothing, really," Aurora says. "I thought it just makes this planning thing more legit.")

Meanwhile, the vlog views _boomed_. Aurora won out their argument via three rounds of arm wrestling, and he relented putting the footage of Mallory and Diaval's moment only if their faces were blurred. She had no problems with that.

They thoroughly documented Aurora's plan too, of course. Which, in summary, went something like this:

Phase One consisted of Aurora dropping subtle indications and suggestions on her parents every chance she could get, with 'subtle' being a relative term. The girl's just about as subtle as a freight train.

The result: They didn't get the hint. They, apparently, were about as dense as lead.

Phase Two is what he brands as 'The Set Up'. They sent dozens of flowers, candies, chocolates, trinkets, and various other gifts up to Mallory's office every day for an entire week, all of it signed with Diaval's name.

The result: Mallory thought it's just Diaval being sweeter and more overbearing than usual. Diaval started believing that Mallory got a new set of suitors. Philip gained five pounds from all the spare candy.

Phase Three presented itself. The two were called on an overseas trip. But this phase disappeared as quickly as it appeared--it was cancelled.

Phase Four is do or die, involving quite a lot of convincing and some incidents of bribery. Dubbed as 'Project Lockdown', it consisted of locking Mallory and Diaval up in all kinds of places: her office, his office, the pantry, the conference room, the control room, the elevator.

The result: One very disgruntled Mallory, one very panicked Diaval, at least seven people getting angry memos, and hours-worth of security camera footages of two people pacing around.

That was the extent of the plan. Nothing happened. Nothing even slightly changed. Mallory and Diaval stayed trapped in their push-pull, so-near-yet-so-far not-relationship.

Needless to say, Operation (God)Parent Trap (aka Put Those Two in Bed Together or so Help Me) was a total, abysmal, _epic_ failure.

〜＊＊＊〜

"I'm so depressed," Aurora says, shoving a spoonful of vanilla ice cream in her mouth.

"Nnn," Philip grunts and wolfs down a handful of Cheetos.

"I'll never get a baby brother or sister now," Aurora cries. Philip reaches over and pats her on the head, careful not to get cheese on her blonde hair.

"There, there." he tells her.

They continue eating their stash of junk food as they watch some interviews they did of some of her godparents' co-workers and friends. It had been a last ditch effort, with Aurora's plan not working and all, and testimonials of people close to the two seemed like a decent follow up. At least it's a solid proof that other people do actually see the love too.

"You know," Philip starts, pausing briefly to open a bag of Doritos, "maybe we were wrong."

"What?" Aurora asks.

"Maybe we should have let it play out by itself," he says, handing the chips to her. "I mean, they look like they're about to crack in the video we saw."

Aurora seems to consider what he just said. "Say 'crack' again."

"Crack," Philip obliges, biting on a Dorito with more force than usual for emphasis. They pause for a moment to watch what Grimhilde--Snow's stepmother and Mallory's friend--has to say on screen.

"They're hopeless," Aurora sighs, as soon as that particular bit ends. "I mean, it's not like they're just gonna figure it all out all of a sudden and jump into each other's arms and--"

A loud thud from downstairs interrupts her.

"Did you hear that?" she asks, putting down her ice cream carton and looking behind the doorway to her room. "Sounds like something fell over."

"Maybe it's just a cat that climbed over a window," he replies, and pops open a can of soda.

"Pip, this penthouse is on the twentieth floor," she reminds him.

They wait for a few minutes for more sound, but none came. Eventually they shrug it off and get back to their eating.

"Anyway, as I was saying--"

_clang_

"Pip," Aurora whispers, "I think we have company."

He swallows his soda and they both look at the clock: ten thirty. Her parents are at a charity gala and won't be back until twelve.

"Get something," he tells her. He browses over her things and finds a baseball bat. He stands, and looks over at her only to see her pulling a frying pan out from under her bed. He gives her a look.

"Rapunzel swears by it," she explains.

They move in close to each other. The sound of dishes breaking alerts them and makes them flinch. They start walking out of the room before Philip retreats briefly and grabs the camera from her desk.

"Seriously?!" Aurora hisses.

"It's for _evidence_ ," he replies.

Both of them creep carefully down the stairs and across the living room, makeshift weapons and camera at the ready. They stop just outside the kitchen--the place where the noises are coming from--and try to look at each other in the dark. More thuds and shuffling noises come from inside.

"We go in and you switch on the light," Philip says in hushed tones, and he sees Aurora's head bob up and down.

"Ready?" he whispers, positioning himself and training the camera. "One, two..."

All of it happens in a matter of seconds.

He raises the bat the moment Aurora pressed the switch, and drops it almost immediately. Two mugs lay broken on the kitchen floor, with coffee beginning to seep through the wood. Bar stools were upturned, and on the counter....

On the counter sat Mallory, her hair disheveled and her black dress bunched up to her thighs. She has her legs wrapped around Diaval's waist, her arms snaked around his neck, and her lips locked with his. Diaval is holding on to her hips, his pants visibly loosened and his own hips are grind--

He shuts his eyes. Beside him, Aurora drops the pan and _screams_.

Mallory and Diaval spots them and must have broken apart from each other, judging by the shouting and curses and the rustling of clothing being put back into place. He still can't bear to look, but he fumbles for Aurora's head and places a hand over to where he thinks her eyes would be. She still hasn't stopped screaming.

Before anyone can say anything, Philip grabs Aurora's hand and bolts out of the kitchen. He practically drags her, sprinting down the hallway and up the stairs, stopping briefly to close the door to her room and turn the locks.

Both of them collapse against her door. Her screams have turned into a form of shrieking laughter, but he could only clutch at his chest and try to catch his loud, heaving breaths. And his eyes, oh god his eyes.

A weight pulls at his hand. He looks down, and sees the red light of the recording on the camera.

〜＊＊＊〜

The days following the Incident were, in the simplest of terms, _tense_.

He was careful not to come over, but Aurora filled him in. Apparently, everyone acted as if nothing had happened.

"I can hear them in her room, Pip!" Aurora tells him excitedly over free period. He nods, and scratches his eyes to fend off the image.

"But it looks like they're being extra careful not to show it..." she adds, looking a little crestfallen. "At least we're sure they're together now, right?" A smile makes it way back to her face.

"Yeah," he agrees. It's all good, really. And he genuinely wanted those two together too, for Aurora's sake. 

Doesn't mean he liked seeing them _at it_ though.

He cringes at the thought. Over to his right, Aurora tugs at his sleeve. 

"You should come over again. I think the coast is clear."

Philip agrees. They talk about future episodes and how he should edit them on the way to her penthouse. They concur not to include what they recorded that night, and she laughs at the look on his face every time she mentions what happened.

He feels light. Finally, this will all be over with.

They step into the living room, and freeze in their spot. Mallory is waiting for them, standing in the hall with her arms crossed over her chest. Her eyes are narrowed and her lips are pursed. Beside her, Diaval is holding a laptop with the vlog logo on the screen.

"You two," Mallory says, her voice dangerously low . "We need to _talk_."

Aurora whimpers, and Philip's blood runs cold.

He starts praying for their lives.

〜＊＊＊〜

The theme music starts to play, and the title sequence follows. Aurora appears on screen again, sitting in the middle of her room like always, smiling her bright smile like she always did.

"Hey everyone!" she greets, waving her hand. "I'm really sorry to say that yes, this will be our last episode." A wistful look passes over her face, but she covers it up with another smile.

"You see, this vlog has been, uh... _discovered_ ," she explains with a cringe. "I know, I know, messy. But I only got grounded for two weeks so that's not so bad, right?"

"Although I couldn't really imagine how it could be bad. I mean, my parents are FINALLY together!" she squeals, and claps her hands.

"And yeah they don't want me divulging any more details so Philip and I have to take this all down within a week, so if I were you I'd make sure to catch up during that time."

"But you know what else?" she asks the audience. "Okay I'll let you in on a secret..." she looks around and scoots over to the camera. "Godfather asked me for help. He's gonna be proposing soon!" she giggles. 

"Isn't that exciting? Don't worry," she assures the viewers. "Philip and I will find a way to get back to you guys. Until then, keep posted on this channel."

"Well," she says, stepping back and smiling again. "It's been a wild ride, and my parents have stopped being idiots. I hope you guys enjoyed it all as much as I did." 

"My name is Rory Reginald," Aurora voices for the last time, looking a little regretful but still very happy at the same time. "And this vlog is signing off!" She winks and salutes the audience.

The screen fades to black.


End file.
